Another year, another set of trends. This industry seems to move at the speed of light. In 2019, we kept up with trends impacted by the power of the user; it’s important that our marketing strategies remain relevant to our audiences. We focused on elements that serve a human-rights centric industry: the positive impact of building trust and user transparency, brand safety, taking advantage of AI opportunities and of course, the advantages of booking native programmatically, to name a few. We filtered out the top five 2020 industry trends that may help you turn your content into business outcomes; let’s have a look. Cheers to the new year and decade.
1. Artificial Intelligence- making data-driven decisions for creative solutions
When we visited the re;publica and OMR conferences last spring, one of the main hot topics was the talk around AI, answering the question: are “robots really taking over the world?” Generally, we should accept and learn to work alongside AI and not against it. Getty Images’ Senior Global Development Manager, Benjamin Beavan, offers that AI helps us spot patterns in big data. It then learns like a child, allowing an objective point of view. Consumers leave vast amounts of digital footprints behind in real-time. That said, AI can help online marketers fulfill their needs of spreading relevant content by paving way to data that can be used to build target groups. Using AI technologies, online marketers can track down behavior-based information, analyze it, and use it to derive customized campaigns.
Why keep this trend in mind? AI technology’s analyses of the movement patterns of your audience can help you optimize your targeting strategies, matching the individual interests of each user.
2. Native Advertising and Programmatic buying are here to stay
Native advertising and programmatic buying have been an ongoing topic in this industry for years. This is due to the high acceptance rate of relevant content on advertiser campaigns. According to a study by the Association of German Magazine Publishers (VDZ), 88% of consumers rate native ads as informative. Throw programmatic buying into the mix, and you’ve got greater potential in a successful campaign. eMarketer has consistently reported a steady increase projection in ad spending, where US advertisers plan to spend roughly $53 billion in native and $70 billion on programmatic in 2020. According to an IPG and Sharethrough study, native ads registered 18% higher lift in purchases in purchase intent, and consumers looked through native ads 53% more frequently compared to banner ads. Meanwhile, eMarketer forecasts programmatic to grow the fastest in video, social, and native investments this year.
Why keep this trend in mind? There are many opportunities that native ad formats and programmatic buying bring for all important parties in this digital advertising ecosystem: the advertiser, the publisher, and most importantly, the user.
3. Video- the upcoming dominating medium in marketing
Video ads have high user acceptance. A HubSpot Content Trends survey reports that 54% of consumers prefer to see video content from brands they support. Multidimensional, consisting of moving pictures, sound, and music, viewers easily consumer information instantly. With emotionally-triggered visuals- such as faces and storytelling elements- viewers associate impressionable content with brands. Video media can spark a stronger connection to its viewer, which is an advantage for online marketers when it comes to distributing their campaign message to their target group.
Why keep this trend in mind? According to HubSpot research, more than 40% of people want to see more video content from marketers. When online marketers push relevant, quality content, users accept the content, leading to a better advertising effect and return.
4. Interactive videos- the future of high user engagement
Think about the impact that video ad formats have on a campaign. Now, add another element that can empower and attract users to engage with an online marketer’s campaign contents. The absolute boost in video marketing: interactive video ads. With today’s modern video ad formats, advertisers can embed interactive elements within clips for high user engagement. According to Content Marketing Institute, 93% of marketers agree that interactive content is effective in educating its buyers versus just 70% for static content, whereas 88% of marketers said that interactive content is effective in setting themselves apart from competitors.
Why keep this trend in mind? Simply put: advertisers can easily engage their target users with relevant content for different campaign goals. Users watch videos with interactive offers until the end, leaving advertisers an opportunity to promote their products. No matter what the goal is- branding or performance- interactive videos make for an extremely successful marketing tool.
5. Social media marketing- a new opportunity for content distribution
There are no restrictions compared to other forms of advertising. Advertisers distribute their campaigns on high-quality publisher websites, however, let’s not forget the potential of content distribution on another platform: social media. There is skepticism of quality content placed on social media, however, according to HubSpot research, more than 500 million people use Instagram every day while the average LinkedIn user spends 17 minutes on the site per month. The trend is still rising. This means that there’s another audience pocket that advertisers can target to spread their content on.
Why keep this trend in mind? Leading Global Educator Neal Schaffer, promotes, “If your business wants to survive in organic social media in 2020, I believe that this sort of humanization of your brand will be necessary.” Smart Insights research shows that 86% consumers prefer an authentic and honest brand personality on social networks. Online marketers have the opportunity to personalize their brand on social media. What more, with mobile use continuing to rise, especially a Business Insider prediction of native ads accounting of 63% of mobile display ad revenue this year.
Key takeaway: what these trends have to do you with your business outcomes strategies
We’ve uncovered five trends that we believe will help you yield business outcome success when it comes to thinking about your online marketing strategies for 2020. These trends serve a human-centric approach when it comes to applying these tools to your online marketing strategies. An added bonus? We at plista have the right tools and services to help you fulfill your business outcome needs. From our interactive video ad formats- such as Branded Player and Shoppable Video– to our programmatic, user-independent-empowered Self Service platform are a few of the many opportunities we can offer you.
Do you have questions about your online marketing strategies for your next successful campaign? We are always happy to consult and support you. Please feel free to contact our business outcome experts at any time here.